Editors’ Note: In the latest post in HistPhil’s forum on the Green Revolution, Marci Baranski explains the special place wheat played within the Green Revolution, and why that history might not necessarily work as a model for future programs of agricultural development. Very recently, wheat overtook rice as the highest acreage food crop in the … Continue reading
Author Archives: HistPhil
Raising Yields and Losing Genes
Editors’ Note: Helen Anne Curry continues HistPhil‘s forum on the Green Revolution. Here, she argues that the history of the Rockefeller Foundation’s involvement in the conservation of crop biodiversity offers insight into how the foundation navigated the science and politics of a problem that it had itself contributed significantly to generating. In 1943, the Rockefeller Foundation … Continue reading
Ford Tackles Inequality?
Editors’ Note: Against the backdrop of Ford Foundation President Darren Walker’s announced efforts to address inequalities on the global stage, HistPhil hosted a conversation this past August on the ability of philanthropy to address societal-wide inequities. At the Ford Foundation offices in NYC earlier this month, Walker discussed further his vision for the organization with Stanford political scientist Rob Reich … Continue reading
Can Philanthropy Feed the World?: A Review of David Rieff’s The Reproach of Hunger
Editors’ Note: HistPhil continues its forum on the Green Revolution with this review of David Rieff’s The Reproach of Hunger from Gilbert Levine and Ruth Levine. The world has done a remarkable job of feeding itself. Despite population growth, the Food and Agriculture Organization reports that the prevalence of hunger in most parts of the developing world … Continue reading
To be Young, Rich, and Philanthropic
A few weeks ago, on the NCRP blog, Ryan Schlegel wrote an insightful post pushing back against some of the breathless celebration that had surrounded the promotion of “hacker philanthropy,” the term that Sean Parker coined in a Wall Street Journal op-ed to describe the giving of his tech mogul peers. Philanthropic “hackers,” according to … Continue reading
Philanthropy at the AALS Conference
For those interested, on Saturday (January 9), at the annual Association of American Law Schools conference in New York, from 8:30 AM to 10:15 AM, there will be a panel on “The Philanthropic Sector and Radical Reform.” Here is a brief description: “Reforming the philanthropic sector is always in the news. Most legal proposals, however, are … Continue reading
U.S. Regionalism and the Many Histories of the Green Revolution
Editors’ Note: Tore Olsson continues HistPhil’s forum on the Green Revolution. The reach of U.S. philanthropy has rarely been contained by national boundaries, and in the twentieth century, this was especially true. Readers of this blog are likely familiar with the vast global footprint left by institutions such as the Ford, Rockefeller, and Carnegie endowments, … Continue reading
Was the Green Revolution a Humanitarian Undertaking?
Editors’ Note: With this post from Jonathan Harwood, HistPhil begins a forum on the Green Revolution. The GR is often touted as one of the greatest achievements of twentieth century philanthropy, but perhaps with no other initiative is the gap between assessment of its impact and significance by scholars and practitioners so wide. With this … Continue reading
Philanthropy at the Upcoming AHA Meeting
This upcoming Jan. 7-10th, the annual meeting of the American Historical Association will take place in Atlanta; and in anticipation of the event, I have culled a list of panels that might be of interest to HistPhil readers. We hope to see you there! Of course, please let me know if I missed any panels, and please also reach … Continue reading
A Review of 2015 & Looking to 2016
Thinking back over this year, many thanks to the 500 Twitter followers, 300 email subscribers, and over forty contributors who have made this site an exciting place for conversations on the history of philanthropy. Fellow HistPhil co-founders Stanley N. Katz, Benjamin Soskis, and I launched the website this past summer with the dual purpose of strengthening … Continue reading
Confronting a Philanthropic Past: A Review of Rosenfield’s A World of Giving
Editors’ Note: Benjamin Coates reviews Patricia Rosenfield’s A World of Giving: Carnegie Corporation of New York – A Century of International Philanthropy. As a pioneer of modern philanthropy, Andrew Carnegie was among the first millionaires to face criticism not for his stinginess, but for his largesse. Why should society admire a man for giving away wealth … Continue reading
The Salvation Army and the Balance between faith-based ministry and philanthropy
Editors’ Note: HistPhil’s forum on the split between philanthropy and charity continues with this post from the Salvation Army’s Jennifer Byrd. On street corners, in front of shopping centers and businesses all across the United States, the yearly Christmas season ritual of The Salvation Army’s red kettles and bell ringers stands as one of society’s … Continue reading
Philanthropy and the quest for Civic Competence
The Chronicle of Philanthropy has just published an editorial I wrote on the responses to the Zuckerberg-Chan announcement and on what they might suggest about the public’s engagement with big philanthropy in the years to come. I was tempted to include in it some additional reflections on an earlier episode from American philanthropic history in … Continue reading
The Long History of Philanthropic Impact Reporting
Contrary to the impression given in many philanthropy blogs and in the pronouncements of contemporary movements such as “effective altruism,” providing evidence of philanthropic impact is not a new development. It has been at the center of the voluntary sector since its rise in the early nineteenth century. Evidence of the impact of the “philanthropic … Continue reading
Curating Philanthropic History
Yesterday, the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History unveiled a long-term Philanthropy Initiative, which includes a new display, “Giving in America,” and a collections effort that “represents Americans’ gifts of time, talent, expertise and money.” They also held their first annual philanthropy symposium, “The Power of Giving: Philanthropy’s Impact on American Life” featuring eminences such as Bill … Continue reading
The Indeterminate Politics of the Charity vs. Philanthropy Divide
Editors’ Note: The following post, from HistPhil co-editor Benjamin Soskis, continues our forum on “charity vs. philanthropy.” It is adapted from a monograph Soskis wrote last year, “Both More and No More: The Historical Split Between Charity and Philanthropy” for the Bradley Center for Philanthropy and Civic Renewal. One of the more fascinating elements of … Continue reading
Charles Taylor on the sources of the philanthropic self
Editors’ Note: Jeremy Beer continues the site’s ongoing forum on “philanthropy vs. charity” with a discussion of Charles Taylor’s A Secular Age (2007). Leaning on this 2007 work, Beer analyzes whether “the moral sources of modern philanthropy [are] adequate to sustain philanthropy’s ideals of ‘universal human dignity and well-being.’” In various places throughout his immensely important body of work—including … Continue reading
Reflections on History and ARNOVA
Editors’ Note: On Friday, at its annual conference in Chicago, ARNOVA (Association for Research on Nonprofit Organizations and Voluntary Action) held a mini-plenary: “History, Nonprofits Organizations and Voluntary Associations: Plenary in Honor of Peter Dobkin Hall” at which scholars in the field debated the role that history should play within the research organization. They also discussed … Continue reading
A Review of Linsey McGoey’s NO SUCH THING AS A FREE GIFT (2015)
In his synopsis of last week’s Hudson Institute event for Linsey McGoey’s No Such Thing as a Free Gift: The Gates Foundation and the Price of Philanthropy (Verso, 2015), fellow HistPhil co-editor Benjamin Soskis mentioned that the site will be engaging further with the book. In this vein, here is a link to my review No Such Thing as a Free … Continue reading
A Review of Peter Brown’s RANSOM OF THE SOUL (2015)
Editors’ Note: Furthering the site’s ongoing discussion on the history of philanthropy and charity, Adam Davis reviews Peter Brown’s new book The Ransom of the Soul: Afterlife and Wealth in Early Western Christianity (HUP, 2015). It may at first seem curious for a blog on the history of philanthropy to review a new book about the relationship between … Continue reading
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